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People with the sort of money that lets them buy $45m penis extensions are exactly the sort of unimaginative arseholes who should have most of their wealth taxed and distributed to people who might actually do something useful with it.

Yes. But... But But... But.... These are Google Execs! You see, when a rich executive does something that is frowned upon, they bring shame to their company. But when a company does something that is frowned upon, no one blames the exec. It's a completely unilateral relationship where there is absolutely no personal responsibility when an organization does something wrong, but it is ENTIRELY the organization to blame if the executive officers decide to do something like this.

Are you getting it yet? The entire corporation that is Google isn't living up to its standards because 2 individuals don't!

While there are various subtleties, externalities, and subsidies to consider, it is usually a fairly safe bet that a large expensive object, if produced by anything resembling a contemporary global supply chain, will have a substantial environmental footprint. Exactly how large can be more difficult; but between transport costs and hydrocarbon chemical feedstocks, price and size are a reasonably good proxy measurement.

There's a little secret to the economy. Even though rich people make huge profits and take large salaries if most of it goes into investments it doesn't matter much. When the money is invested somewhere it's adding value to the world. It isn't going to feed the hungry, but it is going to increase efficiency, build businesses or enable people to live a decent life. After it is done doing that it can be reinvested to do it again and again pretty much forever.

As far as I know, he can't buy a hollowed out volcano; I certainly haven't heard of one for sale. A luxury submarine, on the other hand, can be purchased on the open market (albeit for a price that mere mortals like you and I can't afford), and I think it would be obscenely cool to own one.

In the Google navyYes, you can yacht the seven seasIn the Google navyYes, you can put your search at easeIn the Google navyCome on now, people, they're going greenIn the Google navy, in the Google navy

I predict they will cruise around the world taking photos of every harbour, ship and shoreline.

I also predict they will get into trouble for doing that.

All of the world's marine traffic [marinetraffic.com] in real-time is already on Google... (ok, its basically just overlayed AIS data, but still its effing cool ! just try to find an application that is cooler! or is it wetter?)

All of the world's marine traffic [marinetraffic.com] in real-time is already on Google... (ok, its basically just overlayed AIS data, but still its effing cool ! just try to find an application that is cooler! or is it wetter?)

Carbon footprint of racing sailboat is pretty much 0, at least while it's actually racing. I'll grant you that construction and the diesel auxiliary contributes to greenhouse gas emissions, and especially if they're having it moved around on a container ship so it's ready to go in exotic locations, and then flying in to sail on it, they're pretty much at the head of the line in terms of their individual contribution to future generations' climate-related misery. But overall, I think sailboats should be way down your list if you're making a catalog of climate-hostile consumption.

Still, I realize this is slashdot. Let the poorly-informed outrage fly!

Not to mention the noxious chemicals in the epoxies, manufacturing the carbon-fiber to start with, etc.

And the manure from horse racing has its usefulness. More than the discarded carbon-fiber components from the sailboat, which at best lay inert in a landfill, and at worst leach interesting stuff into the aquifers below when the landfill inevitably fails.

As these are proper ocean cruiser boats you are not going to move them by container ship. 24m worth off composite hull is something you move by water with a hired crew, not by ship. Sailing such boats from A to B so that the person with excess pocket money can use it where they want it is a pretty good job if you can have it by the way. I would not mind being a sailing crew on one of those:)

So the only greenhouse emissions are from the leerjet flying you to the sail

you can easily move very large ships from ocean to ocean via a piggyback ship.

in fact, there are ships designed for this very purpose, and moving a large sailing yacht is one of their main customers.

these specialized ships take on ballast and essentially purposefully flood their own decks and then the large sailing/motor yachts are driven over the deck, pilings are set to support them, and the ship pumps out the ballast to raise itself above the waterline.

The world is full of liberals/socialists/workers/puritans/humanists who live by their beliefs. You usually don't hear them in the media because they're too busy living off a worker's wage, possibly playing a part in a local union, looking after people in the family and community, etc. to have the money to make their voice sufficiently loud.

Unfortunately, like the undergrad banner-waving protester who says "capitalists r evil hypocrites look at Bush/Hitler!", we have childlike Randroids with the idential "li

The world is full of conservatives/religious people/workers/puritans/humanists who live by their beliefs. You usually don't hear them in the media because they're too busy living off a worker's wage, possibly playing a part in a local union, looking after people in the family and community or church, etc. to have the money to make their voice sufficiently loud.

So it's come to this. After all those centuries, English, this is what you've become. Face down in the left gutter wearing Comic Sans with an empty carton of Strunk and White. Googling your own blogfeed indeed.

It does and I guess that is Taco's problem. Even after all these years he still has some of the reactions from the days when Slashdot was being run on an Alpha salvaged from a skip and put under the desk in his dorm room.

But what about Good Google? How much carbon is saved each year, for example, by their handy maps? (Now if I could only get my wife to stop printing them out and just write the directions on a piece of waste paper) How much does Google reduce carbon by efficiently locating points of interest -- and someday -- helping you get your car to the nearest electrical outlet. Sniping at rich people's yachts is I guess a family tradition but the real problem with carbon hypocracy stories is they really don't take in t

This is my documentation that if someone from google wants to buy the best in personal/corporate submarines, it's over here -> http://www.ussubmarines.com/submarines/phoenix_1000.php3 [ussubmarines.com] Check it out, you will be impressed if you haven't seen it before. How much for the finders fee? I might be able to right my own ship if everything works out;-)

Probably when pigs fly; or maybe when all power is gleaned solely from the sun and/or nukes. But then that only accounts for carbon created for power generation. What about the emissions from the servers themselves while running, plastic wire coatings decaying, the actual creation of the parts that make up the servers - etc., etc., etc.

The only way for Google to ever be green in reality is to cease their business. Let's get real.

I'm a Republican that met Dick Cheney in the Las Vegas airport bathroom, he didn't tap his foot or shoot me in the face with a quail gun.

I do own guns, and I'm more than happy to get my news from alternative sources and accept alternative views. Hell I lived on a Kibbutz for a year and support tax hikes on the wealthy. I also voted for the Democrat for the Governor of Alaska in '10 (he ran on more of a drilling and pipeline platform) and wrote in Murlowski in the race against the Tea Bagger.

Speaking as a non-American I'm not sure you have any leftists in your country, but that aside, what people in the rest of the world are afraid of is that the most powerful county on earth could even conceive of electing someone as patently thick as Palin.

Then again, you've got previous with George W Bush, Reagan and so on. At least in the UK our evil politicians like Thatcher don't have learning difficulties.

You can't even understand the difference between being overly passionate and dangerous rhetoric. GP was abrasive, but not violent. No mention of a "second amendment solution", no mention of "reload", no.. well you get the idea...